Silk Road, as I reported previously, is the online illicit drug marketplace that has defied law enforcement efforts to close it down. Last month, Silk Road reported the greatest scam in its fifteen-month history, which cost the site’s users over a hundred thousand dollars in just two days.

Silk Road’s vendors live and die by their reputation and feedback, which buyers give much as they do on eBay. Nobody on Silk Road had a better reputation or more enthusiastic feedback than Tony76, a vendor of heroin, stimulants and psychedelics from Canada.

A screenshot from online drugs marketplace Silk Road, taken April 2012

More Australians are buying illegal drugs from internet websites and having them delivered by regular post straight to their door. Eileen Ormsby reports on the new frontier of drug dealing.

IT’S JUST like eBay, complete with vendor feedback, sales, prize giveaways, gift certificates, and escrow and dispute resolution services. But Silk Road doesn’t sell CDs or used clothing – it’s a one-stop, internet shop for illegal drugs. Buyers quoted on the site’s forums say the drugs are cheaper and of higher quality. Customers are also keen on the fact that they no longer have to meet an unknown dealer in a dark alley somewhere.

And the delivery of drugs bought (illegally) on the Silk Road website is not carried out by a typical drug dealer – it’s done by the postman.

A growing number of people in Australia have abandoned traditional channels for buying illicit drugs in favour of purchasing them on Silk Road. Established a little over a year ago, Silk Road has grown from a relatively small operation into a thriving marketplace where consumers of illicit substances can browse listings of everything from prescription drugs to cannabis, methamphetamine, cocaine and heroin.